I have hit my very first stall on stronglifts at 200 lbs squat 5x5 and i am not sure if this is normal or if this is too early for someone to stall on. I have heard of people getting further on their squats before stalling but i am not sure if squating low bar vs high bar makes a difference. I am squatting high bar atg i also stalled on 105 lbs 5x5 on the press. People have been telling me to eat more calories but i fear of gaining excess amounts of body fat. Currently i weight 165 lbs and eat 3 thousand calories. I am not sure if that should be sufficient or if i should eat more.

When to switch from StrongLifts 5x5 to Madcow depends on your body-weight and age. A 27y old male weighing 185lb will usually have to switch to Madcow after reaching the 300lb Squat (remember to switch from SL5x5 to 3x5 and 1x5 first). The lighter/heavier you are, the sooner/later the switch to Madcow.

He doesn't say it but older people will have to switch earlier too. Your calories are a little low but not unreasonably.

_________________Stu Ward_________________Let thy food be thy medicine, and thy medicine be thy food.~HippocratesStrength is the adaptation that leads to all other adaptations that you really care about - Charles Staley_________________Thanks TimD

will going up to 3,300 make a difference my main concern is becoming fat.

The general rule of thumb for bulking is 20 times your weight so 3300. However, it won't make much difference in the muscle growth and not having to stop to lose fat may save you time later so you can go either way. Maybe there is a sweet spot there that works best for you and you just have to find it. You might also want to cycle a bit. Maybe reduce carbs on rest days and increase them on heavy lifting days.

_________________Stu Ward_________________Let thy food be thy medicine, and thy medicine be thy food.~HippocratesStrength is the adaptation that leads to all other adaptations that you really care about - Charles Staley_________________Thanks TimD

_________________Stu Ward_________________Let thy food be thy medicine, and thy medicine be thy food.~HippocratesStrength is the adaptation that leads to all other adaptations that you really care about - Charles Staley_________________Thanks TimD

The advice to "eat more" is a bit too vague. Here are some factors that will allow you to break plateaus, including a note about food.

None of these are dogmatic. They are "most or nearly all of the time" but life prevents us from perfect adherence. So 8 hours of sleep means most of the time about 8 hours of sleep.

1) Improved sleep is always good. Do you get 8 hours regularly? Eating more w/o sleeping enough severely reduces the value of that extra food.

2) About 1 gram of protein per pound of body weight every day. There are different opinions about protein powder but I find it very convenient. I like the Protein Isolate which contains no cholesterol.

3) If you smoke, your lifts will go up a couple of weeks after you quit.

4) My lifts went up recently when I drastically reduced my caffeine, but I'm a serious caffeine hound and would do 6-10 cups/day.

5) Every single technique improvement that becomes permanent will increase your lifts. Tape your lifts and post them and plenty of people here can comment.

6) The "X factor", which is the gains you make by being around other committed and capable powerlifters that offer instruction, encouragement and general comraderie. If possible, find a powerlifting gym.

Personally I can rarely improve more than one of those in a period of a few weeks. I'm a slow learner, but they add up.

I think I stalled out at ~215, and would've weighed about 140 at the time. The big issue for me was the upper body component, however. My left shoulder has bone spurs and bursitis at a minimum, so pressing quickly became overwhelming. I agree with everybody else, unless you're stalling due to joint pain, deload and give it another go.

_________________don't you know there ain't no devil that's just god when he's drunk

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